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One of the little tasks of these past couple of weeks was to fill the small screw holes through the car's floors with seam-sealer, and to paint over those. These were the holes from self-tapping screws used to keep the carpets in place, clearly some had either pulled out or could not be found when fitting new felt or carpets, as in all there were over 80 holes ! I still needed to shop for some new grommets, aside from those for the wiring, there's two for the speedo / rev counter cables through the bulkhead and then two more for the handbrake cables. Wallace was not in when I dropped by for Gromit, so I went to the club (East Saxons TR group @ the Alma) meeting yesterday evening and my friend Rich kindly brought along a selection of grommets to suit, so they'll be swapped out over the course of my doing other tasks. In anticipation of refitting the gearbox cover I've just replaced the speedo cable. That instrument's needle tends to move in a jerky manner and reads inaccurately, so I'm hoping an unkinked new cable may help fit it, without the cost of an instrument rebuild. ( .. still an optimist Pete ? ) ^ In the course of replacing the cable, I rerouted it through the pedal box / master cylinders bracket, so its run is now very much smoother and imo neater too. It used to come up passed the steering column and then have to kink around the back corner of the bracket to then go through the same hole through the bulkhead Other pottering around jobs recently included . . . ^ The vibration damper, which hangs under the tail-end of the gearbox didn't have its security bracket, so I twisted one and fitted it. I think its purpose is to prevent the weight from sliding backwards and fouling the driveshaft UJ, should its clamp work loose. So I could have used wire, but this was almost as easy. And as you might gather I do like the car to be accurate to original specification ^ I also replaced the rear bearing in the starter motor. This being a high-torque type, fitted by the prior owner, from the TR shop in July 2004 Again due to radiant heat from the exhaust down-pipes the lubrication of that bearing dries out and it had gone notchy (..is that a technical term ! ? ). The rubber cap over the wiring connection had perished and I found that an old rubber slave-cylinder cover fitted on there quite nicely, with its hole filled-in with black silicon sealer. ^ Another task was to make a back panel for the map pocket I made in the side of the gearbox cover. This is to be easily removable for access to the gearbox oil-level plug. The plywood was reclaimed from a small fruit box, and is painted just to keep damp out, but at some time I'll cover it in vinyl. The back face will have sound deadening on it. The strip of steel was in my bag of off cuts, and all I needed to do to that was to round its ends, de-burr it and drill a couple of countersunk holes. If it were chromed it would look nice but for convenience I've just painted it silver. next . . . The rubber dam I made for between the engine bay and the gearbox had a wobbly top section. It's too tight between the gearbox and the underside of the heater to get another fastening in there, so I recycled the aluminium from an old paper-towel holder. Cut to shape with a jig saw, it was nice and easy to work. Back to work on the gearbox cover . . . ^ I used the same ribbed rubber (previously the rubber mat used on shelves in a shop) for noise absorption inside the two parts of this steel gearbox cover. The issue was of course twofold. 1. keeping it there (rather than it draping down) after a while, and 2. getting / keeping it tight into the corner shapes. CT-1 adhesive was used for the former, and stuffing it with sponge and soft wadding, while that adhesive was setting, sorted the latter . . . ^ The insulation is a work of patchwork because I just started with a limited size of rubber, and that had various holes through it, but on the whole it worked well. The white CT-1 is not pretty but then I could if I was worried about how pretty it looked (..inside the gearbox tunnel, when fitted in the car with carpets over it !) paint it. I glued it in several stages as that was easier to handle and again for pushing it into the corners, while in the meantime worked on a heat shield . . . ^ previously the back of a boiler, a corner of that steel was formed and fitted under the front of the exhaust manifold, as a shield to lessen the radiant heat to the dynamo (which is just an inch-and-a-half away). That heat causes the rear bearing's lubrication to dry out, and so the bearing fails, this in turn causes the armature to wobble and chew itself up ..which is why I was obliged to replace it. Seen above, as work-in-progress - it still had to be much tighter fitting (to the manifold), so the dynamo can be rotated all the way to the engine to fit the fan belt. While doing this I discovered another little problem. . . ^ the dynamo bracket was broken, the hex-head set-screws were all different lengths, and the hole for the rear end of the dynamo was worn rather badly. Hey ho., Katie must have thought I was looking for another job to do ! A car like this is like being married ! ^ I welded bracket back together, taking care not to have a corner build-up where the front bolt hole is, and then I added a short length of steel tube to the rear ..as a bearing surface for a 5/16" UNF plain-shanked bolt. In practice, with the heat shield in place, I couldn't get such a long bolt in from behind (from the exhaust manifold side) so the bolt comes in from the front and a lock-nut is fitted at the back. My apologies for an inaccurate photo. ^ As noted on a recent thread, from a side-screen TR owner, on the TR forum, I'm not the only one who finds that rear pivot-fastening a right awkward so n' so to reach. With a heat-shield fitted ..its no easier ! The plain shanked bolt went into the bracket's new tube easy enough, and then I had to lay under the car to start the lock-nut onto the thread. And then, from above again, I could get an open-ended spanner onto that nut to hold it as I used a ratchet-ring-spanner to tighten the bolt. Thankfully I'll not need to remove it very often. The three screws holding the bracket are through the engine case and so need to be considered a potential oil leak. All are now the correct 5/16" UNC x 3/4" long hex-head set screws, with Loctite 5922 'flange sealant' on their threads, and on the back-face of the bracket around the holes. And so there we have it. . . ^ Probably because the rear end of the dynamo is held in line, I've found that the dynamo rotates closer to the engine, and fitting this large section fan onto the pulley is now really easy. And the heat shield is fitted in place. The screw threads into the forward facing bosses of this exhaust manifold are 3/4" deep and have BSF rather than UNF threads in them. I don't believe a heat-shield was fitted as standard to UK cars, but it appears to have been planned for, or may perhaps have been specified for some overseas markets.? I think that's enough of my waffling on for today, so I'll bid you, one and all, a good evening and a great weekend. Pete.

^ she a relentless bitch, the job list never seems to get any shorter. I do one and she finds two others me too ! I was cutting the insulation for under the gearbox cover today, but because I don't have decent contact adhesive - it's a two part job gluing it in place ..well the way I'm doing it anyway

Body mounts . . . Following-on from two weeks ago, I've not been in the best of health and so have been pottering rather than getting on with the job in hand, nevertheless following Gareth's question, on the TR forum, regarding 'Mounting body to chassis TR4A' < here > ..I thought I might add a few notes regarding the washers and rubber packers used during the refit of Katie's body to the replacement chassis. The bolts (or rather hex-head set screws) were replaced for new, together with the spring washers and penny washers. I say penny-washers deliberately as they are rather different to the original body washers . . . ^ two penny-washers don't equal the one thick body-washer. Indeed as you can see, even after such short use, they bent quite easily. This is because as one penny-washer dishes in, it radially slips relative to the other. Naturally this cannot happen with a single, twice-as-thick, washer. In practice, the nickle-plated penny-washers fitted were 1.2mm thick, so their combined 2.4mm thickness was already a fair percentage less than the 1/8" steel body washers previously (originally ?) fitted. As a rough estimate, using a beam-deflection calculator for solid steel ; 2x 1.5mm penny washers deflect about eight-times more, under the same load, as a single 3mm body washer. The penny-washers also measured at 28.5mm diameter, whereas the original body-washers were 1-1/4" (32mm) in diameter. Probably a bit OTT for many of you, but I took the time and trouble to custom make plates for the main body mounts . . . ^ The main body to sill mounting plates I've cut and fitted are from 3mm thick steel, three bolt fastening for the rear, and square ones (second photo) further forwards. The latter are 85 x 80mm and so have over double the clamping area of the original four 32mm dia body-washers. I've used stainless steel penny washers over these to save the paint chipping out under the bolt head. I've not used spring washers because there's already spring in the rubber mounts, to dissuade the bolts from working loose. Oh and yes, I've used plain-shanked bolts through the rubber. There's also a reinforced-rubber gasket on top of / between the floor and these body-mounting plates, to accommodate any discrepancy in surface (..for example, where the edge of the inner sill sits on the floor panel). All fastenings were of course put in with a generous smear-over of Copaslip. The forward-most footwell (square) plates are off-the-shelf bright-zinc-plated items from the fastener supplier. They have 10mm holes but with plain washers that's fine. Again they sit on reinforced-rubber gaskets to seal out moisture from under the car. These being particularly susceptible to road spray, as they are just behind the front wheel-arch. Was it worth the bother ? Well, firstly the cost to make them yourself is negligible, but for a few hours of workshop time. But then probably because of my career background I'm practiced in considering worse-case scenarios. In this instance, that's what happens when some other vehicle T-bones you at a junction. Having designed and produced very lightweight kit-cars, I had to accept that we were not driving around in armoured tanks, but on the other hand., there's a whole lot to be said for a lightweight car being simply knocked out of the way, rather than statically sitting there trying to absorb the full impact. Of course being knocked out of the way only works if the car stays together.! My concern with the skimpy penny-washers was that, in such a scenario, they would tear through the floor's body-mounts, allowing the body to peel off. So to me - the few hours spent in making these plates were worth that little bit of reassurance. Regarding the rubber packing, I don't know where M&T bought theirs from, but they were not reinforced with nylon (or similar) strands, and so when compressed they creep / squeeze out. That was evident in the distorted shape of their holes when they were first removed. Perhaps this illustrates just how flexible they are . . . Even just pinched between finger n' thumb, the stretch distortion is quite evident. The hole in one had already split to the edge. Katie had three of these rubbers in each sill body-mount, packed one on top of another, which like the thin penny-washers shown above would move relative to each other. In short time these would have 'settled' and the body mounts, tucked out of sight under the carpet, would have been loose, and the body would have been moving / chafing against the chassis. Pete

Didn't know they existed, but like the idea, so I ordered one on Saturday - cheers Nigel. Thanks again Nigel, prompted by this.. I pre-peeled the backing paper off the sticky-back neoprene I'm using . . . ^ Although the suggestion was to peel the backing paper and move it along a little, I peeled it off for a couple of foot, and moved it over to one side just a couple of mm (if you'll excuse my mix of measuring units) before cutting each to size and with its slant (that's quickly done because I use pieces cut to left or right handed length as templates to save measuring each). So obvious (in retrospect) and then so quick to do the peeling this way. Should it be of interest to anyone, the second photo shows the total amount of 2mm x 30mm neoprene strip I used ..under just one side of the body tub. On Sunday, I added these to the passenger side floor, so these pads are now across each chassis rail where the pressed indent of the floors cross them. I've also fitted the body-mount pads on that side too. But for spacing the two diagonal braces in the engine bay, the body is now almost ready to bolt down. I've bought 5/16" plain shank bolts for most of the mounts as I'm really not keen on set-screws threads through rubber &/or spacers. That's just a peculiarity of mine ..as it probably matters not one iota. Before bolting it down I remembered that I had not cleaned out and painted deep into the first sill-body-mount I'd encountered ..that was the one just forward of the RH trailing arm. So this afternoon I did that, and then while laying down in that corner released the front and bottom edge of that rear wing to clean up and paint the end of the sill covered by that wing. Is it better not to know ? . . . ^ First impressions, was of rust-bubbled-paint on the sill, near the front edge of the wing (seen here with that paint scraped off with a favourite old chisel), but also just behind this was a hole through the outer sill panel ..through which the end-cap could be seen. I didn't know about this, never-the-less the weather was great and I'm practicing a happier state of mind (..yeah I know, I need a whole lot of practice ! ) Second photo shows how it looked after power wire brushing + flapper wheel. That'll not do. ^ I made a repair plate to tuck inside the now-trimmed-back-to solid-edge, with holes ready drilled for plug welding. Zinc spray paint included copious amounts inside the sill cavity. ^ plug welding with edge tacks worked well, and the inside of the end cap, as seen from within the wheel-arch is still tidy. Where the repair is hidden under the bottom edge of the wing, and for a "good n' solid driver" I don't feel the need to dress it further. I through drilled the round hole, for the spire clip fastening, and zinc sprayed into that edge too, let it dry ..and then slapped red paint all over. Job done, but for refastening of the rear wing and bottom stainless trim. So hopefully tomorrow I'll get Katie's body bolted on again. Until then, I bid you a very pleasant evening. Pete.

You each reflect my own ponderings. however although I loathe the crudeness of spire clips and in particular those with the very coarse body screws, the hole size through the panel they are fitted to (the sill in this case) does offer a little adjustment (even if only 1/16") in each direction, which combined with similar amount of hole slack in the panel gives 1/8" or so in any direction of adjustment. A fixed-position thread in the sill may necessitate a looser hole in the exterior panel which itself is often (as in this case) within a pressed depression. I don't like these clips, not least because they tend to scratch the paint off those edges, and so will give the matter further thought ..and research into what modern vehicle use. Not planned for this winter nor springtime, but sometime I'd like to remove each wing ..to address any rust and fraying edges hidden deeper up inside the wheel arches. Hopefully by then I will have come across a better solution. cheers, Pete

Just a short report this evening, mostly because I spent part of the day catching up with putting things back together, like refastening the offside front wing where I had its lower screws out ..to paint into the crevices, and of course re-hanging the exhaust silencer and adjusting its clamps so the pipe doesn't clonk the tunnel. My task this afternoon was to get on with refitting the body to the chassis, which is again sitting on four wheels ..albeit still on the ramps so I can crawl under the car. ^ fussy as I am, I didn't like the main body mounts now each being three layers of relatively soft rubber. There were no mid-layer plates in those mounts, and the new rubber is without reinforcement mesh ..so when compressed its thickness easily squashes down as the rubber tries to squidge out the sides ..as is evident in the shape of their holes (second photo) ..after just 6-months / 250miles. Katie's old chassis showed clear evidence of where the body and chassis had chafed together - locally taking the paint off each, and undoubtedly adding to the squeaks, rattles and the humdrum of vibration type noises. These are not isolation body mounts ( Isolastic type), but if I understand the design correctly - their rubber's give is to accommodate disparities in angle &/or surface shape in the bracket on the sill / body panel and the chassis. 2-3mm is thick enough to do that. The soft rubber is also a weather seal inbetween the underside of the car and its interior. Sandwiched Inbetween these two rubber 'gaskets' would be spacer(s) ..I'm guessing in steel. That's not what I have now nor what I had previously. Rather than refit whatever there was (seemingly numerous horseshoe shaped spacers), I opted to measure again . . . ^ I set the body on the chassis without any mounts in place. Instead it sat on six little packing pieces of 3mm thick hardboard. These were placed on the chassis just under the edge of the bulkhead, and again on the corner-reinforcement-plates at either end of both trailing-arm chassis rails. The doors gaps are as they were and the doors open and close well ..now that the nearside anti-burst plate is lubricated ! Measuring and recording (2nd photo below) each body mount / the gap between the body and the chassis, I could then determine what packing was actually needed. ^ I had lots of rubber & spacers parts to choose from, as Mark was very good in returning the bits taken off the car, when replaced with new. The old body mounts were all (fabric) reinforced rubber and generally a tad thicker than the new so I could select what & where was to be fitted. I started with loosely fitting the two front mounts (one on either side of the radiator) and then those at the end of each rear outriggers. Even with loose bolts, those helped keep the alignment square. But before fitting the central body tub's mounts I wanted to fit some rubber strip under the floors. M&T seemed to have forgotten them, even though a roll of the rubber appears in one of Mark's photos. Nevertheless I had a roll of 2mm thk x 30mm wide neoprene rubber which although pretty soft I felt would do the job well. ^ my old chassis is typical of many photos I've seen (as a body is lifted off) where the body-chassis mounting strips are only rested upon by the deeper pressing of the floor, and then only occasionally. So again, me being me, I did things my own way. . . ^ short strips being cut to fit under the pressings where they cross over the chassis rails. Doing this under the car ..as evening turned to darkness, and feeding the sticky-backed neoprene in the 3/4" gap between the body and chassis didn't make it a quick operation, but the fiddling around to peel the backing paper off each little length took me longer than fitting them.! An extra pair of hands would have been helpful to un-peel the backing and, only then, to cut each length. Then of course to pass them down to you under the car. As indeed would have marking the underside of the body tub (where the chassis sits) and to do all this .. before the body was fitted. Including sorting thicknesses and now having loose-fitted the central mounting rubbers, the task took me 2 hours ..for one side. I've lowered the body now and these strips will I think work well. None of the mounting bolts are screwed in more than a few threads (because I need to lift the near side floor tomorrow to do the same), but already the tin-plate floor sounds very much duller. Even though the strips barely touch the chassis. clearly it is cushioned. My hope is that with the extra surface area, of these strips versus the original short lengths fitted in just a few places, it'll stand up to wear pretty well. Time will tell. That's it for tonight, so I bid you a pleasant evening. Pete.

It wouldn't have made any difference because the threaded part goes inside the sill, and the length from hole to end would still have been too long. Pete

Thank you Gents ..although I'll continue to cuss about having to crawl under the car to correct things - I just have to accept that things which might, and perhaps even ought to, be flagged or else should have been done, were simply not. 'Why' is almost irrelevant to me, that is a matter for Mark to address, should he feel the need to do so. Unless one has absolutely everything down in writing and signed by both parties, the client to service-provider emails and face-to-face discussions & telephone conversations amounts to nothing more than "a sort-of-understanding" ..which may interpreted in different ways to according to one's perspective. Thankfully, although frustrating, no harm was done by way of road-accident, nor injury, nor even further damage to the vehicle. As as design-engineering professional in the automotive and then marine industries, I was subject to professional ethics & due diligence, whereby if I was even concerned about the safety of the item I was working on (whether or not I was responsible for those aspects of the design) I was expected, nay obliged, to bring my concerns to the manager or a Director's attention. If it was a potentially very serious matter - then I'd make sure there was a paper trail, which aside from covering my own donkey.. also encouraged the Manager to pass that concern upwards to cover his ! When working on design of seriously-offshore sailing vessels there were many instances where vessel and life might be put at risk (in the Southern oceans even large sailing yachts can roll over, loose their mast and otherwise become awash). Still, I know as a matter of fact that, many of those concerns were never acted upon, as was evident in the keel dropping off a certain 82 Oyster yacht ..and the vessel quickly sinking. So even in that white-collar-professional environment the system didn't work (..thankfully there are better procedures in the aircraft industry !). Very likely, because I had a long career of such responsibility and working to such ethics, my expectations of a farm-building restoration company were unreasonable, not least because my 'understanding' and theirs were as if in a different language. I simply have to accept it, try to learn from the experience, and to move on. But that doesn't mean I won't get pretty verbal now and then.! Yesterday I was again contorting my ungainly and aged bulk underneath to wield the potentially lethal cutting-disk grinder (it is very intimidating ), and then to be laying under the sometimes splattering weld ..so was my language reflected not the sweet and full of the joys of springtime. ^ In setting the body back down onto its mounts, I'd discovered was that the rear exhaust bracket was sitting too high and so the body tub (actually the spare wheel well) was resting upon it. With the body jacked up, but still less than 3/4" above it, and with working around the exhaust silencer, it either had to be reduced in height or else removed. Lessening its height wouldn't work for the bolt to the exhaust strap and so I decided to cut that bracket off ..which was welded to the top of the cross tube .. ^ Awkward little bracket and vicious high speed grinder (not to mention the white hot sparks !) ^ same bracket reshaped to be 3/8" (10mm) lower, and then re-welded in place. ^ repainted with POR-15 and the red underside of the body also touched up. The other side was easier because it had been welded on at a cock . . . ^ On this side the rear inside corner of the bracket was digging in, so I simply cut that corner off, cleaned things up and repainted it. Another 5-miute job done ..that literally took me 2 hours. - - - Next job was the bottom LHS rear wing fastening to the sill. Its new spire clip was snapped into pieces. With a strong magnet and small screwdriver I managed to retrieve three of its bits out. I think one piece is still inside. I'll be painting and then wax-oiling within the sill so that should stop it rattling. I cleaned up an old but good spire clip to replace it and repainted that with zinc, but when I came to fit it discovered it would not fit . . . ^ just inside the round screw hole you'll see the sill's end cap. The distance between this and the hole is insufficient to get a clip in there and for it sit flat. Of course, without it sitting flat, then when the body screw is tightened.. the clip snaps. I don't yet know how to deal with this, particularly as the screw hole needs if anything to go backwards, even closer to the sill's end cap. Hey ho, such fun we have. Pete p.s. I bent the inside end of a replacement spire clip further back on itself, so the tread would get closer to the inside of the sill's end-plate. I used needle / long-nose vice grips to do that. The part of the tread nearest the double-back snapped off when I put the screw in, but because the bit I'd curled back reduced the hole size.. it works. ^ horribly crude, but I'll come back to it another time. Cheers, Pete.

Late to your party, but I think from the photos I'd lift the body, borrow, buy or make a wheeled rotary spit, and then use low pressure a shot blasting gun. I've seen this done by a chap in the States and he did just one section at a time before painting it ..so it wasn't such a dramatic task despite work periods fitting inbetween rainy weather. He'd do a few hours, sweep up the yard of grit, give the cleaned / blasted area a coat of paint ..and that would give it enough time to dry in the evening and overnight before he tackled the next section the following day. To me that's the only way to do the job properly and in the end I think might be quicker than struggling to do things with rotary brush and scotch wheel tools from underneath. After all, most likely a lot of the rubber under the car would need replacing by now too, likewise brake & fuel pipes and wiring, cables, exhaust mounts & their clamps, etc. ..and everything on the chassis is easier (read quicker and better done) when access is not via crawling under the car. With a car that's not been molested by budget welding - I think the old girl deserves a make over once every sixty years. I have in the past, with my Citroen, tried using chemical rust converters to get rid of the rust. That appeared to work great at the time but thereafter I still had rust stains coming through the new white (2-pack) paint, from in the overlapped of the panels. It was as if rust converter carried on even after I had jet washed it away and dried the car in breezy summer air (you remember that sort of air ??). I'm reluctant to use any sort of chemical converter again. Hope that helps, Pete

I do like that Spitfire, especially in white.. I wonder if I'd still fit in one ? I did have a lot of fun in my MkII. I wonder if I'll ever have the same enjoyment in driving the TR. Seems like all work and no play right now

Just over a week later and I'm still wrestling with motivation, however 'upset' and poor health (..and yes they are related) have slowed progress.. Still as always ; smalls steps in the right direct are much better than a leap or two backwards (..but more of that later !). Having previously worked from the RHS rear wheel-arch, back to the body mount, then forward along the near-side's sill, and across under the spare wheel well.., the delectation to now be relished was to continue with much the same on the LHS (nearside) of the car. Again my objective was to clean up, to check, and to hold-in-check the condition of the underside of the body tub. Again starting under the (LHS) rear wheel arch. . . ^ This is the corner of the inner wheel-arch where it steps over the rear axle / suspension, and like the RHS of the car the thin metal panel of the rounded corner had failed. On the RHS the plate had crack through, whereas on this side it had buckled and was just beginning to crack. Note the vicinity of the new (TR6 style) body mount immediately adjacent to this corner. Again I made a thicker doubler plate to fit behind the original corner. Holes are of course for its plug welding. BTW., the silver paint on the inner wheel-arch inverted bulge (to allow the seat to move 3-1/2" further back) is aerosol zinc spray. This is useful for spraying into any cricks & crannies, for seeing more clearly into corners, and of course to prevent ones lungs going rusty ..for years after you're dead ! The rear body mount on this side had already been welded up by a prior owner in much the same way as I did it on the RHS. And again I added a large thick reinforcement washer to this side for through-bolting the recoil seat belt to. NB. measured and drilled from the inside of the car, this hole is 10mm further back from the step's edge, because the mounting position of the recoil mechanism is asymmetric. - - - Moving forward was where my discomfort of working on cold paving slabs, in cleaning off the crud and any loose under-seal, as well as my having to weld under a wheel-arch.. turned to my upset. Having paid a whole lot of money to a "concourse winning restoration body shop" (M&T Classics) to rebuild Katie's LHS sill, and at the same time to improve that side's rear door gap.. after clearing away the goop (aka ; seam sealer ) I was faced with this . . . . ^ work in progress, as you can see the professionals goop is still over the bottom flange, but the end cap not being attached to the downturn of the floor was (.. I thought) inexcusable. For cost reasons, I opted not to have the sill finished in body paint by M&T., but the agreement was that it would be prepared and ready "in (I presumed in a good-quality) primer ready to paint". That was clearly not what I was seeing. The second photo more clearly shows how the old outer-sill was cut off through the down-turned flange of the floor, and then a new plate has been tacked in place to restore its dimension to the bottom. Unfortunately the new plate wasn't quite tall enough, so its spot welding along the bottom became edge tacks (which structurally are not the same). And, as you can see, its bottom edge didn't come down quite far enough and then slightly raised towards the front. ^ further forward, as it was.. with no primer but a smear of goop, and yet also clearly evident of their stitch welding (from the outside before the outer sill was fitted) of the extended downturn flange - having blistered the original paint and under-seal away. This is a shameful example of British workmanship.. with rust initiated from day one. I hadn't appreciated that despite having paid extra for wax-oil injection - it didn't include the sill. 2nd photo, after wire brushing. Clearly the flange isn't quite deep enough, in fact for most of the sills length its short by 1/4" (6mm) with 5/16" (8mm) or more in some places. That does not seem a lot, but because the bottom flange of the repro outer-sill-panel is not quite 1/2" (12mm), that inside edge was where spot or plug welds ought to have been. So instead it's been edge-tacked. Typically these are 1-1/4" to 1-/1/2" (30 - 38mm) apart. I'm no authority but my understanding was that DVLA requires welding of structural areas (ie., within 30cm of a body mount) to be of equal specification as original (accepting plugs in lieu of spot welds) or else continuous - so I wouldn't have thought this would pass an MOT. And yet I have the piece of paper to say that it did.! For reference, you might compare the (above) work by M&T, with a post from Stuart (last June) where he shows how it ought to be done < here > . . . ^ Lovely job Stuart, and using a NOS Stanpart panel for better fit. I'm sure the additional cost of that was saved in fitting and finishing labour costs. I don't know what the spot welding is in the inside of the end cap though. Moving to the front ..of Katie's newly rebuilt sill, and things get no better . . . ^ More goop, which when wire brushed out revealed no weld between the bulkhead and the sill's end cap. (NB the bulkhead repair appears old / done by a previous owner). I simply cannot understand why the welder should not have done this, while he was already here with his welder. For the time being I have welded the end caps, front and rear. But before going further I'm in a quandary as to whether I should do more to improve what's been done along the inside and bottom edge, or else to remove the outer sill and the new down-turned flange and to rebuild them, or to just leave it as is ? The outer sill visually aligns well from the side view, but that panel's fit or incorrect shape means the bottom-relief of the wings (front and rear, which steps out from the bottom of the door line) now sit 3/8" 10mm wider than the sill (..just seen in light-yellow colour primer to the right of the above photo). Before the car went to Wolverhampton, the old outer sill was a decent shape between these panels, it was only the rear door gap which was wrong. Now I seem to have paid a huge amount of money to replace one problem with another. When I spoke to Mark about this panel alignment (..before I noted the inadequate welding) he said, and I paraphrase.. "the front and rear wings were probably repro and so the alignment would never be great, and that ..had they been painting the sill, they would have first lead-loaded the panel to correct its shape". 3/8" thick lead weighting down the length of one sill, huh ! I didn't argue the matter that I'd expected the agreed 'in primer ready for paint'. - - - And now for something completely different . . . While under the car getting myself filthy, but nevertheless making slow but steady progress cleaning up fraying paint edges and otherwise checking that things were pretty much as they were supposed to be, I spotted this .. ^ Note the lower wishbone mountings. I couldn't believe my eyes. The chassis was sold as upgraded "with all the usual strengthening mods done". And Katie's suspension was removed, and cleaned up before being swapped from the old chassis to this one, and yet despite the bolt holes being there (and that M&T have a huge stock of TR parts on their shelves) the lower wishbone brackets had not been swapped for two-stud ones. Not even decent sized backing plates or washers. And to then have reused the nyloc nuts ? From a restoration company that professes to be TR specialist, Is it not professional-incompetence to not even ask the customer if he would want these changed.? After all, even to a cheapskate - what is the cost of a set of used 2-stud TR6 brackets and eight new nylocs ? ...after spending such a huge amount of money to have the chassis upgraded, so the car would be safe. If I said no, then be it upon my head, but them to say nothing, and for the sake of £30 (retail) to not swap those brackets . . . is unbelievable It gets even better though . . . ^ on the left hand side, rear lower wishbone mount - this chassis had already had one of the brackets ripped out. The plate welded over the top of the hole has two stud holes. And Mark knew and saw this himself, because he hand-painted this chassis with the POR-15 I'd supplied. As an engineer I consider patching over the top of a ripped-out plate to be very poor practice. Much better to cut out the damage and to inspect everything very closely to see if there are any hairline cracks or other damage that wouldn't otherwise be apparent. But I can appreciate that many an unschooled mechanic might weld a similar thickness of plate over the top and think that must be as strong as it was. And with honest regard for the few who do think beyond their immediate eye line, the typical unschooled mechanic misses the consequences. . . ^ with a plate slapped onto the face of just one chassis mounting, the wishbone bush bracket sits 1/8" further out, and so it's no longer in axial alignment with the front wishbone bush. And that twist of the lower wishbone would take its wheel hub mounting / king-pin further forward, which in turn effects the castor angle. This might be compensated by packing out the front bush mounting, but then does that still work with the wheel's camber.? As it is this side of the suspension has be reassembled with no packing / spacer(s) in the front bush bracket, so (likewise twisted) each bush will be prone to accelerated wear. Conversely the RHS of the car has two spacers (each 1/16" ?) under both brackets - which I gather is usual. As I've now been working on the gearbox or under the car pretty consistently since she came back in July, I'm rather very upset that the task list has again been added to. My objective was to get the underside of the body shell painted and the body mounts all back in place by the end of January, so that I might get back to putting the car's interior in, and then get on with fitting the surrey top. But now I'm faced with both the sill and with replacing the wishbone brackets. I've never done the job, but I'm certain it'll not be just-a-five-minute-job ..when working outside in February. I've tried to be very understanding of Mark and how sloppy mechanical practices could slip by unnoticed by him, but following the chassis T-shirt plate being gooped-on rather than welded, failed body mounts, such body-shop issues as the sill, and now being faced with more working under the car / the front suspension - I feel as if I've been caught by my short and curlies again. I've been trying for the past 12 months to accept a more Stoic / understanding attitude ..but tbh the pent-up upset / frustration is have a noticeable effect on my health. I don't know what to do about these conflicts, so I bottle things up and get on with what I can. . . . ^ The welding on top was not mine, nor the piece of angle iron. I just cleaned the goop out and welded down the downturn to end cap joint, before flooding everything with zinc ..and then the red. It's presently a goop-free zone ! The wings will have to come off at sometime to keep their condition in check, but I'm hoping not to do that this winter. ^ until I decide what to do, I've again sprayed crevices with zinc and brushed in the red. I have absolutely no problem with tearing that paint off again if and when I choose to do something more with this 'issue'. It may seem illogical to leave it, but for the meantime - I just need to move on. ^ Similarly with with the front of the sill, the front body mounts, all the edges around the inner arches, which restored 22+ years ago were in remarkably very good condition, but now in need of a little TLC ..to help keep the damp out. The front valance panel had a fixing screw missing, one along the top of the RHS front wing likewise, and then also the three wing to A-post fastenings were left out too. And so it goes on.. I am so (physically) tired. - - - Progress yes, but two leaps backwards as well. I bid you warmth in your home, good fare on the table, and a peaceful state of mind. Pete.

It's all gone quiet around here Ian.. must be time for an update surely ? Pete

Seems like the first thing to do would be to check / measure the wheel relative to the chassis rails, rather than to the body, on either side. Pete.

I wonder if anyone has a Standard-Triumph torque figure for the rubber spaced body to chassis mounting bolts on their car ? Or any UK model classic car ?? I ask this because there's not a figure quoted in the TR4 / TR4A manual, and there are twenty-seven 5/16" UNF bolts (or hex-head set-screws) in the set, most of which fasten the thin-gauge floor pan ..albeit frequently but not always backed up by an also not-very-robust body mounting bracket. (by "not very robust" I mean that I could easily bend such a bracket by hand, via a pair of mole grips). The mount's clamping is of course through reinforced-rubber pads, some 1/8" thick and others at 1/4" thick (surely there to help prevent the transmission of vibration ?). Those bolts are also shown in the parts book as having split lock washers to prevent their vibrating loose, which again will splay out when overly tightened. Accordingly, I would have presumed the bolts ought not be very tight ..perhaps just 6 - 8 ft.lb. ..or possibly 8 -10 ft.lb at the body front & rear extremities (ie., outside the occupant enclosure). Conversely, a TR expert / professional on the TR Register simply suggests they need be "tight". Admittedly, to me that word is like saying a bit of string is "long". Btw. even if a grade-2 (standard / low grade steel) 5/16" fine threaded bolt, when tightened to 11.25 ft.lb - has a clamping force of around 2400lb (each bolt). What's the point of having a 1-1/2" diameter rubber pad clamped under a ton compression ? Thanks, Pete

After a couple of days off, this afternoon I did a little pottering around rather than real work. Thought I'd deal with the T-shirt plate. Whether or not anyone else thinks having the top (TR6) T-shirt plate on a TR4A chassis is worth the bother is not really the issue - It's something I wanted as part of the chassis mods., so this afternoon I set to bolting it in place. . . ^ first up I decided to drill and tap into the chassis, where the TR5 & 6 have their seat belt mounting hole. The T-shirt plate was drilled to just clear a 5/16" UNF bolt, and then the chassis was drilled and tapped for that bolt. Although there's only a couple of threads into that thickness of chassis - any movement here, between the T-shirt plate and the chassis, would be in shear ..and so that bolt needs to be a good fit but not that tight. With that on either side, plus the standard TR4A body mount alongside the rear tunnel gives four fastenings for the plate, and so I added a couple more ..in the back inside corner of the floors . . . ^ Drilling into the rear corner, though to the chassis, not only allows the T-shirt plate to be clamped under it, but it is also where there is a corner gusset reinforcement (to the rail onto which the trailing-arm-brackets are mounted). In short this means - there's twice the thickness of steel to tap those bolt threads into. Furthermore and rather importantly ..to my nerdish way of thinking . . . ^ The new inside-bottom-corner mounts tie in nicely with the TR6 style chassis to body mounts, I specifically had added on the step next to the inner arches. On the chassis these body mounts are immediately adjacent to the suspension's spring hangers. The new inside-bottom-corner mounts also offer load-path-continuity along the rear chassis rail to the sill's rear body mounts. All together they add cross-bracing (signified by blue lines) of the body-tub combined with chassis, that was absent from the original. Possibly this helps clarify the significance of the T-shirt plate and why I required for it to be secure. OK., I'll close the door on the way out. . . Pete

I am well pleased with this Johnston's red paint. And with it being spirit rather than water-based I hope it'll stick well and then do its job ..which of course is to help shed road dirt and moisture off. This afternoon was pretty darn chilly out.. but lots of break-dancing type spinning around under the back of the car kept that well at bay. Unfortunately though I had more welding to do, which I'd spotted before - but now was the opportunity. . . ^ again the MOT man with the white stick missed this loose body mount, even though it was very much clearer to see from the underside ..because it has a flipping great rust hole through it.! I'd spotted this bracket's bottom flange, which under-laps and should be spot welded to the underside of the spare-wheel-well, was adrift when I first investigated why the body was sitting low on the driver's side. Only in scraping it clearer of underseal & seam sealer today did I realise that one of its side flanges was also loose, from top to bottom, and there were perforations (albeit only dime-sized) through the panel into the wheel-well. Of course, there was a whole lot more cleaning out of seam sealer, rust and crud too. In the circumstance ..of the body only being 2" above the chassis ..and so very limit access between the mount and the chassis rail for cutting or grinding tools, I managed to tear the rusted underlapping flange off ..back to the rust hole, and then set out to replace that with new. ^ Inside the spare wheel. The upward ones follow the run of the original spot welds. I drilled through-holes to be plugged with weld, from both sides, and then used a couple of self-tapping screws to hold the body-mount-bracket tight to the side of the well. The through-holes in the floor are likewise to plug-weld the bracket's new bottom flange on. The set screw with washer simply held it in place for welding. ^ Work-in-progress. Aside from the plug welds I added a few more tacks around the outsides of each flange. All in all, that may have seemed a five-minute job, but from first to last of these piccies took me 3-hours.! ^ I used copious amounts of zinc spray-paint inside the bracket and into the edges, let that dry and slapped-on the red. It wasn't pretty before so I expected little else when I was done. ..but at least it's secure again. NB. the shadow / bottom corners (both front & back) were deliberately not closed with seam welding ..so road water inside the bracket might drain out. Oddly, that bracket is wide open to spray off the tyres. The inside plug welds linished off nicely. The last remaining perforation is plated over from the wheel-arch side, so now it's well flooded with zinc and paint, I'll simply seal over it on the inside as I redo the bottom inside-corner seam. - - - While at this end of the car with the welder . . . ^ I did this same task with my previous, also bright red, '66 S-type Jag. It is of course the hole in the middle of the spare wheel well, through which the tie-down hook attaches to the chassis. As such I guess it ought to be considered a body mount too. In any case I don't want a split-edged hole, so I welded a disc to its underside. Just hope I've got this hole in about the right position.! ^ I then added another very large washer to the inside. Thereafter lots more zinc, and a splash of colour. . . . It took me all afternoon to do just those two jobs ..so I could never make a living doing this professionally. But who knows, perhaps I've eliminated another two sources of rattle ? Bidding you a good evening with toasty warm toes .. quite unlike mine at this moment ! Pete.

I can't believe the psychological difference this flash topcoat of paint, underside the car, has on me. My attitude is changing from the car being an "acceptably tidy car from 10 -15ft away" to a car that is being 'nicely restored and is well on the way to being a good example' ..whereas in truth I'm just tarting her up in places ..where no gentleman ought to look. Not only that but I'm actually enjoying doing this painting, despite it entailing my crawling around on the floor like a fat pink worm on cold concrete slabs ! hey ho., I hope to enjoy it ..for however long this refreshing attitude lasts . . . ^ this afternoon I continued painting the underside of floors and the body tub, wherever I could reach, but particularly where (when lowered again) it will be near-resting on the chassis. These two piccies show the underside of the spare wheel well and the body's step over the rear axle. ^ the outside edge of the floor and the inner sill plate, with it's body mounts. ^^ the underside of the driver's foot well. Tbh It's looking in much better condition than I realised. I'm 65 years old and I'm sure my thinking that is a first ..with any car I've owned ! Bidding you a very pleasant Sunday evening, Pete.

Aargh.. Now I'm really seeing RED ! . . . . . . Have a good evening, Pete p.s. I tried to give it a stipple finish but it didn't work very well.

..This afternoon I got back to crawling under the car. I wonder if it will ever end ? I started off by undoing the eight still-fitted body-chassis bolts, but found the rear four were not tightened up anyway. The two new mountings I'd had added (duplicating the TR6 ones on the forward suspension bridge) were done up ..but not very tight. And the end two, at the rear of the chassis outriggers, were just rattling about loose. .. yet another source of rattle identified. ^ Oddly, I needed to drill a hole in the bottom of the outrigger to get the socket extension in. These holes were already in my old chassis, but not in this one ..so I wonder if the rear outriggers had been replaced with new generic sections. The second photo simply illustrates how to get the bolt, its washer (not two thin penny washers as again used here, but a proper thick body washer) and socket on / off that extension (..without their dropping down into / along the chassis rail !) Anyhow, back to lifting the body .. I just slackened-off the front mounting bolts, and the same on the left-hand-side of the car, to help keep the body-to-chassis alignment, before jacking under the driver's side sill to lift the rear end of that side of the body up. It raised an inch but then seemed hesitant, so I looked around and at the exhaust to see what else might be holding the body down. I found the front-right diagonal strut bolt, which I had slackened off was not yet slack enough, and (..like a twit ) also discovered that I'd forgotten to undo the bolt through the centre of the boot floor / spare-wheel well. Thankfully with my monitoring / feeling the lift - nothing was overly stressed. The steering column was sorta interesting though, because I assumed some degree of lift would be possible through flexing its rubber donuts. I checked to see if it still moved freely and it did, but that was because the spline to the bottom UJ was also loose. Without the steering wheel on to restrict its movement - it moves up n' down quite freely ! ..Well done M&T's sub-contract mechanic you've once again surpassed yourself. I'm just very glad you don't work on aircraft or else in a hospital ! But yet another source of rattle identified. - - - Moving on, or rather upwards, the body tub (measured above the trailing arm pivots) raised by about 2". That was enough for my needs, which was to get in with a power wire brush ..to locally clean up and repaint the underside of the floor, just above those pivot brackets. . . ^ The first inch of Lift off. I had already started to clean flaky paint and surface rust off that underside slope ..which is why it looks tan coloured, but then I noticed the top plate (a TR6 T-shirt top plate) on the chassis, had a slight gap under it, perhaps 1/8" (3mm) in some places. That was very odd, until I prised it up (2nd photo, with long screwdriver coming in from the RHS) and discovered that it hadn't been welded.! Seam sealer is great for keeping running water off, but it's Fxxx useless in terms of structural stiffness. Man was I upset. After all the trouble and expense to (..as I see it) improve this chassis's structure, which included my providing labelled-illustrations and photos, I get this . ! ? I have spoken to Mark today, and clearly there was a misunderstanding, as we did at the time discuss their structurally bonding the forward extension of this plate down (..I wanted the T-shirt plate extended as far forward as possible.. to the gearbox mount) ...but that objective might be hampered if there were problems fitting the exhaust. In my mind the task would simply be a matter of temporarily clamping the plate in place and attempt to fit the exhaust pipe. If it went in.. then great the plate could be welded (like it is on the TR6). If not, then the forward part of the plate could be shortened or else it might be structurally adhered in place. Nowhere did we discuss the use of seam sealer to just bed the plate on.. It just goes to show how two persons, speaking the same language can understanding things quite differently. My focus was on the one car, whereas his attention was most likely spread across a host of different business matters all happening at once. Again I need to just accept it and move on. In any case., some might say "whats the big deal ?, the TR4A has a bridge over the chassis instead of that T-shirt plate." My reply would be along the lines - that it was an upgrade I'd specifically asked for and which had been agreed on, and so that opportunity (from a structural point of view) and the money spent on buying these panels, was wasted - because now its just sitting there on purposefully flexible goo.! I'll now deal with it as best I can. As I cannot get in there with a welder with the body on, and although a body mount does go through this T-shirt panel (on either side of the driveshaft tunnel) I'm now faced with drilling and adding more bolts to secure it. huff ! - - - You may also have spotted the lack of rubber strip between the body tub and the chassis rails.. I'd noted while working within the interior, that the floor in certain places would metallically contact the top of the chassis. A body mounting kit had been bought and I presume fitted, so I expected to see those rubber strips everywhere they should have been, but perhaps missing a couple of lengths on the extra chassis rails I'd specified. Not so, I haven't investigated further forward but there's certainly none under the back end of the floors nor for the side rails. Despite the body tub predominantly sitting on reinforced-rubber body-mount pads, Triumph also saw fit to use rubber strips ..to prevent the possibility of the pressed-steel floors chattering against the chassis ..both irritating rattle(s) and, as this car previously experienced, exposing metal where paint chafes away. The rubber strip also serve double duty as anti-drum pads. Again., yet another possible source of rattle identified. - - - In the meantime..., back to the task in hand, very locally cleaning up and treating the underside of the floor . . . ^ despite limited and awkward access the underside of the floor panel cleaned up pretty well.. The inside face of the sill (2nd photo) was not so polished, but at least there's not rust holes through it. This painted over is, at best, a rolling resto' make-do. Without this effort - I'm guessing it would likely rust-through within a year of all-weather use. Hopefully though, a good coat of paint will keep the wet out and give me a couple or more years of use, before this inner sill will need replacing. Who knows.. I might have actually started driving the car in that time . ! ? ^ POR-15 is again used as a barrier. Once that's dry it'll be painted over again, so road water splashes will more easily run off. I'll also look in to wheel arch liners. That's it for today. Not a good day for myself, nor indeed for my dear friend Rich. My sincere condolences to him. Pete

Evening all ..not a whole lot to report on. After pulling my lower-back last weekend I seemed to be unable to get it warm, and so my going outside to work on the car ground to a halt. This afternoon I made an effort to kick-start myself into a back-to-work mode. Having reversed and modified the MX5 seat-runner adapters, and then locally altered the inner wheel-aches ..in order to move these seats back by some 3-1/2" ..I needed to clean up and repaint under the wheel arches. . . ^ All-in-all I was pleasantly surprised that despite my having rudely inverted this wheel arch's compound-shape inwards.. the pink primer had stayed almost entirely intact. The conifer green (which was the car's original colour) paint appears to be on top of the pink primer, so perhaps the original restorer was going to repaint the car that colour. However, he sold the car as an unfinished project to Bob Bell, who painted her red. I guess the thin layer of under-seal was applied directly over the green, some 22 - 24 years ago, and that has now dried out and so tends to not stick as well as it once did. Naturally, with that many years since restoration, some of the bottom panel edges would now also benefit from a little preventative care & attention. But, this afternoon I only got around to attending the driver's side - because I found a bit of welding to do. . . ^ The lower seat belt mounting was one I drilled when I first got the car. This was to relocate the retractable mechanism from immediately behind / under the seat (bolted to the sill), so I could move the seat back a bit. As you can see I'd fitted it with a large body washer, which I'd intended at some time to tack weld in place. Plans sort of changed direction for a while though last summer, and so while (again) in this space I thought it opportune to get on and do it. The crack through the panel immediately, below that mounting, is surely an also-missed MOT failure. Not least because I had the TR6 body to chassis mounting added to the suspension bridge ..just the other side of this panel. Interestingly, or otherwise, the dint to the underside edge of that panel (below and a little to the left of the seat belt's hole) is where the body shell literally used to rest on the previous chassis' spring cup. I'd spotted this when seeking to correct the excessive wheel-arch to tyre clearance (post chassis-swap). The body is some 10mm higher now. Anyway moving on., ^ Fortunately nothing but a little surface rust to clean off. To reinforce this corner, I cut a plate to fit behind it, and then drilled the panel so I could plug-weld it in situ. The crack itself was of course seam-welded, and the underside edge of the panel and plate were also stitched together. ^ it was awkward to get around that corner to finish it smoothly, with the suspension bridge in the way, so this will have to do for now. The large diameter, 2mm thick, body washer for the seat belt mount is now tacked in place (it happens to be of stainless steel ..because that's what i had to hand). And then after a little more scraping and general cleaning up, including the end-plate of the sill, I splashed over it with POR-15. Not a very pretty job but once again painted over - it'll keep the wet out and help preserve the car for another 55 years ..or at least until the next phase of rolling-restoration. Oh yes., and while i had the POR-15 out I painted the MX5 seat runner adapters, and also the car's original body mount washers . . . ^ The honeysuckle is doing very nicely, and remains constantly in flower. And the frame for the plastic cover is convenient for hanging nails to dry things on. I don't know how many of these thick body-washers are used on a TR4A, but here are 18 that were previously on this car ..and had been over painted several times over. It took me ages to get these back to bare metal and ready to repaint them. M&T had swapped-them-out for stainless-steel penny washers (fitting two under each fastening). All very pretty looking, but also very wrong because two thin penny washers don't equal a single thick body washer in bending, and so each penny washer bowed as its fastening pulled the floor panel into the rubber body mount.! Anyhow, all of those from inside the car are already out, for my cleaning and repainting of the floors, so refitting the fastenings with these thick washers will be no extra work. That's it for today, and time for a cuppa tea. Pete

Agreed as Josef and Mathew have noted. My point was that you have continuous weld on the underside, next to the captive nut, which satisfies both the structural and MOT safety requirement. And so., the number of tacks on the inside needed only be enough to hold the patch flush / in place while you welded underneath. And as that might have only been five or six tacks (inside the car) then it would have saved you a whole lot of work in welding and subsequent grinding. This is what I had hoped to illustrate in my second example (2nd & 3rd photos). - - - In reality though, you have to satisfy yourself. As you are ultimately responsible for the structural integrity of the repair. And so I suggested you make a test piece ..and try testing those welds (to destruction !) to get a hands-on feel for how really strong a couple of good welds are ..not least compared with what a collar bone, body and/or neck can take in g-force deceleration. if those welds can take double your body weight then that's already got a 100% safety margin ! Now, if that's just a couple of good tacks, imagine how much more the continuous welded plate will take ! So yes, please do observe the legal requirements, as you have now done on the underside, and then finish cleaning things up, fill & paint, or trim over, under-seal inside and out ..as you would normally do. Not to hide anything, but just because that's what you want to see as a finished repair. An MOT inspector may tap it, or may push against any suspect areas to see if it flexes, and may in some instances even use a magnet to ensure there is steel rather than just bondo in the repair, but he will not scrape the paint off, nor remove interior trim to check it. The onus is on yourself to ensure that you are comfortable with its strength. - - - What I'm saying here is, with just half a dozen tacks on inside the car to ensure the plate is positioned and tight against the surface, then you might do the same on the underside. If you were to space those tack welds every 3/4" (20mm) around the underside perimeter, then the stitch-welds between those (to make it a continuous weld) will also only 3/4" (20mm) long. And because the plate is overlapped rather than edge to edge, they ought not burn through. I think you may find those short stitches, to join-the-dots (tack welds), easier than the contiguous tack welds shown by Chris.. Tbh, that's pretty neat work he's doing there .. with accurate positioning at a very controlled pace. Pete

Regarding the structural needs of seat belt anchorages, I do not disagree with regard to MOT requirements. Structurally though it's a very different matter. Spot welding usually refers to localised pressure and electrical resistance welding at points clear of the edges of thin sheet. Plug or slot welding is of course having pre-drilled / pre-stamped hole through one piece and then filling that with welding wire or rod being fused to the second piece. So what we've been discussing / demonstrating are simply edge tack welds. They are quickest and easiest for a novice and/or for thin sheet / rust thinned metal, as each tack is allowed to cool down ..and so blow-holes and distortion are minimised. I would assume Chris's weld would be 'contiguous tack welding'. Stitch welding is very commonly specified for structural Civil Engineering work (where I started my career). Its strength and longevity is required but it's not necessary to seal the seam, such as would be necessary with a yacht's water tank. Typically stitch welding is specified as the number of welds, the length of weld and the space between welds, for example 6x20x30 specifies six welds, each of 20mm long followed by no weld for 30mm. The number of welds is omitted as when all around is indicated, such as around a perimeter, or throughout the length of a beam. As far as I'm aware, it's not usual to specify stitch welding with tacks, but the tacks are useful for holding everything firmly in place, because if someone starts welding (either continuous or stitch) from one end ..then by the time they get to the other end the alignment will most likely have wandered and straightness will have bowed.

You've done really well. That looks a huge improvement and the patch also looks to be well and truly flat to the surface. Tip : cover over (even if just with gaffer tape) or else put an old bolt in, adjacent threaded holes - as sometimes splatter &'or grinding ends up in there ..and is a pig to get out again. I don't know if you have two grinders. I have a small one which I use grinding discs on, and then also a variable speed polishing / linishing machine. It's big and heavy but quite controllable, not least because I can turn its speed right the way down. I often use the grinder (coarse cutting) to take high spots off the welds ..very accurately and then the linisher to finish things smoother. You may also consider whether you need so many tack welds. That might be best ascertained on a test piece which you weld just a couple of tacks and then try to rip apart.! A good weld is incredibly strong. A few spots have missed target ..which may be a matter of requiring better lighting, or your position to better see around the shroud. I know that's often not easy ..when working under a wheel-arch or when contorted within the boot of a car. Perhaps you might try tacks to get things held in place and then short strips of weld inbetween those. Let each weld cool down inbetween times by working diagonally around the patch. Although this gearbox cover needs to be a barrier against noise, fumes and heat into the car, it didn't need any more weld than these. The join is an overlap and so there are also tacks inside, offset from these, so it's very strong. After painting primer into the overlap, I seam sealed it inside and out. As an example of mostly working from one side. With the following I did just a few tacks on the outside, to accurately align and hold things together, and then most of the welding inside. I later ran the angle grinder over the high spots, but it wasn't necessary in this circumstance (under the gearbox cover) to try for a really flush finish . . Like diagnosing a car's poor running or starting fault, its always best to only change one setting at a time ..then retest. I too think you could turn the power up just a tad. However.., you'll also find that when you turn the wire-feed speed down - the metal fuses together a little longer before the weld builds up. I would try that before you alter the power setting. The feed however should be just enough to prevent the wire melting back to the tip. Again I'm not criticising, I'm just trying to offer a few pointers, Pete

I went into their / Johnstone's trade counter (Ipswich Branch) and spoke to the nice lady, explaining that I didn't want water based paint for re-coating painted but otherwise scraped-bare steel ..for the car's inside floors. Also that I wanted to thin it down - to paint the inside of my car's doors. That thinned paint was to capillary into the crack between the pressed door and its outer skin. I'd clean it out best I could, but whatever else was in there would be sealed in. The purpose was to keep the air, the condensation and rain water off the steel. I went on to say that I had been looking at Smooth Hammerite product, but didn't like their having a special thinners. It was also expensive. I said the car was now red (originally a darkish conifer green) and so that would be my preferred choice and Hammerite did a red, but it really wasn't a very good match. The lady suggested this (see below) and offered to colour match the sample I'd brought in (a front grill stay). She used RAL colour cards, and we agreed that the colour she suggested was so close that it probably wouldn't be any better if she used the digital scanner to ascertain the colour mix. We briefly discussed price, and quantity for quantity, it was a little cheaper than Hammerite, and then the white spirit was much much cheaper than Hammerite's thinners. She mixed it up (the can says 0.8 ltr) then and there. I've been delighted with this paint as it covers in one coat (even over bright silver POR-15, zinc, or black) and (aside from on butyl ) stays wet edged for a good amount of time and then dries overnight. The paint smooths out brush strokes well and yet is not so prone to runs as some paints I have used (like Crown Paint's exterior gloss - otherwise also a great paint). In this weather, when painting the car's floors, including flish panels and inner sills, I loosely close the car hood, and then have a fan heater (on very low) just to kick it off ..to prevent runs. I haven't yet needed to thin the paint, as it already rubs well into cracks (..for example where I pulled out the 22+ year old seal-sealer used around the floors of this car and wire brushed that out. Otherwise angled / drawn out brush strokes smooths the paint neatly enough for it to settle flat and glossy. Because this paint was just to seal and colour coat the floors under the carpets - I didn't take them back to bare metal. Nor subsequently take much care in preparation ..just a light rub down of the POR-15 (with 80 grit !) followed by a brush out, quick vacuum and a wipe over with a piece of kitchen towel ..so not exactly high quality prep and not even the use of tack-cloth. As a consequence, this side of the floors have a lot of fine dust pricks ..which I plan to ignore. (NB. I should have used emery paper rather than sand paper ) Still, I sorta liked the painted inner sills, so I'm thinking of leaving those exposed rather than their being carpeting over. Accordingly, I gave their top surface a thicker coat ..which I hoped would settle flatter. It did, and from this piccie, I think you can see that a light wet-n-dry rub down and polish would make them tidy enough to show ..as hand painted sills in a driver, rather than show car. Btw the crinkle just in front of the slotted hole is where I hadn't scraped off the old carpet glue. That's how (not !) good my prep' was Hope that helps, Pete

I left the CT1 overnight to dry. It was only a thin skim (mostly 1-1/2 mm or less but perhaps locally to a max of 2mm to 2-1/2 mm deep). I've not had issues with it before, but then I've only over-painted it with two-pack paints. White-spirit cleans CT1 off your fingers, etc, and the acrylic paint I'm using similarly uses white-spirit for cleaning brushes and as a thinner. I have not tried a water-based paint over the CT1 but I suspect that it would be fine. The gearbox cover I used the CT1 on, as a seam sealer, has been in the warm (my lounge) since being painted on or about the 14th December. The paint is now almost dry. Certainly nothing to stop me handling the cover now. So what's that - 26 days.? Most likely it would have been OK a week ago, if handled with care. I've subsequently tested Everflex - Weather Mate, which is an n-butyl acetate compound to see if that proved any less "inconvenient" ! That sample was a piece dried around the edge of the nozzle (not my tube I might add, as I would never leave the nozzle in such a state !). After painting I left that sample all night and all day in the warmth of my lounge, and the red paint was still tacky enough to come off on my fingers. I'll find something else ! UPOL - Tiger Seal has been recommended. This is a polyurethane sealant. I would check any of these sealants for UV degradation, if it is to be used in direct sun light. On my boat I used Sikaflex to glue a very large skylight onto the outside of its bowed companionway hatch. That was a polycarbonate (Lexan) plastic which needed to be both burglar-proof secure (despite no screw fastenings nor edge frame) and also to 100% seal the window. However that's pretty expensive ..if you just need a small quantity, as it doesn't keep well in its tube once opened. For a car's hardtop or even a windscreen seal I'd investigate silicone sealant. That is a product I really don't like near paint nor in engines. If any paintwork or local touching-in of paint chips needs to be done, then that should be done before the silicone is used. Pete